JP2002036631A - Image-forming apparatus - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To simplify circuits and speed up an image rotation/mirror image conversion process by realizing the process by hardware in relation to an image rotation/mirror image process means of an image-forming apparatus. SOLUTION: There are provided an up-down reversing means 12 for reversing image data up and down, a right-left reversing means 13 for reversing image data with the center in a Y axis direction of the data being made a center axis, and an XY reversing means 14 for reversing image data to interchange X-coordinates and Y-coordinates of the data. The image data are subjected to the rotation/mirror image process by a combination of these means.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus for performing rotation processing of image data. For example, the present invention relates to an image forming apparatus that transmits a command from a host processing device (hereinafter, referred to as a host) such as a personal computer to a page printer. The present invention relates to a page printer device that performs print processing by rotating and mirroring an image of data.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art In recent years, page printer apparatuses have been widely used, and there has been a demand for high-speed and low-cost print processing in such systems. In particular, there is a need for a technique capable of high-speed printing even when image data to be printed involves rotation / mirror image conversion processing.

In a conventional page printer, either the host or the page printer performs the rotation / mirror conversion of image data. However, when the rotation / mirror image conversion processing is performed on the host side, the processing time on the host becomes long, and there is a problem that a large processing load is imposed on the host, and the page printer apparatus often performs the processing.

[0004]

However, when rotation / mirror image conversion processing is included in the printing processing on the page printer side, it takes a long time to print, and in particular, 90 °, 180 °, and 270 °.
When a rotation process such as a degree is performed, or when a rotation and a mirror image process are performed, there is a problem that a circuit is complicated and a processing time is required.

[0005]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned problems, and enables high-speed printing even when rotation / mirror image conversion processing is performed during printing processing, thereby simplifying the circuit. It is intended to provide a means.

More specifically, when storing input image data in an image memory and / or reading image data from the image memory, an image forming apparatus for performing rotation / mirror image processing of the image data includes: Up / down inversion means for vertically inverting image data, left / right inversion means for inversion centering on the center of the image data in the Y-axis direction, and XY inversion means for inverting the X-axis coordinates and the Y-coordinates of the image data for inversion. And an image forming apparatus that performs rotation and mirror image processing of the image data by a combination of the vertical inverting means, the horizontal inverting means, and the XY inverting means.

With such a configuration, the image data
It is possible to easily process the rotation every 90 degrees and the mirror image conversion processing for each rotation.

[0008]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. In the present embodiment, a page printer device that receives and prints image data from a host processing device such as a personal computer will be described. However, any image forming device such as a copying machine or a facsimile that prints image data is used. It is.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the configuration of the inside of an image forming apparatus according to the present invention. In a case where printing involving image rotation and mirror image conversion processing is performed, the host processing apparatus performs image rotation and image conversion without performing image rotation and mirror image conversion. FIG. 4 is a block diagram showing a means for transferring and performing rotation / mirror image conversion processing on image data received from a host processing device by a page printer device. In FIG. 1, 1 is an image rotation / mirror conversion unit, 2 is an image memory, 3 is a mode register, 11 is a memory cell, 12 is a vertical inverting unit, 13 is a horizontal inverting unit,
Reference numeral 4 denotes an XY inversion unit.

The image memory 2 is a part for storing black and white dot patterns of image data as 1 and 0 bit patterns. The mode register 3 has a rotation angle of every 90 degrees,
And means for storing mirror image conversion pattern information,
The three bits D2, D1, and D0 in the mode register 3 are assigned to vertical inversion, horizontal inversion, and XY inversion, respectively. When each bit is 1, the inversion is performed, and when 0, no inversion is performed. The rotation angle and the mirror image conversion processing are performed by the combination of. The combination of each inversion will be described later.

The image rotation / mirror conversion unit 1 is means for rotating / mirror-converting image data stored in the image memory 2 in the page printer, and is a core part of the present invention. In this embodiment, a case will be described in which image data stored in the image memory 2 is read out, rotated / mirror-converted, and stored again in the image memory 2. The received image data is stored in the image memory 2. In this case, the rotation and mirror image conversion processing may be performed, and only the image data after the processing may be stored in the image memory 2.

The image rotation / mirror conversion unit 1 comprises a memory cell 11, a vertical inversion unit 12, a horizontal inversion unit 13, and an XY inversion unit 14. The memory cell 11 is a means for temporarily storing image data to be subjected to rotation / mirror image conversion processing, and is a group of registers with consecutive addresses.

The vertical inverting unit 12 is means for inverting the image data in the vertical direction as shown in FIG.
When writing image data to the memory cell 11, each bit of the address is inverted. By this operation, the data to be written to the address 0 is written to the last address of the memory cell.

As shown in FIG. 2B, the left-right reversing unit 13 sets the center of the image data in the Y-axis direction when the horizontal X-axis and the vertical Y-axis are defined. When writing image data to the memory cell 11, the MSB and LSB of the data are exchanged, and the MSB-1 bit and the LSB + 1 bit are exchanged. Thereafter, by performing the same replacement, the image data is horizontally inverted.

The XY inverting section 14 is means for inverting the image data such that the X coordinate and the Y coordinate are interchanged, as shown in FIG. 2C.

According to the present invention, the up / down reversing unit 12, the left / right reversing unit 13, and the XY reversing unit 14 share or combine the reversing process by the mode register 3, thereby making it possible to store 90% of the image data.
A feature is that rotation is performed every degree and mirror image conversion is performed, so that simplification of a circuit and speeding up of processing can be realized. FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a conversion processing state in the image rotation / mirror image conversion unit 1 according to the setting of the mode register 3, FIG. 4 is a truth table summarizing image data, and FIG. It is a figure which shows the image data of the state which carried out the mirror image processing in the state which rotated every 90 degree, and the state which rotated every 90 degree.

FIG. 6 shows a flowchart of the rotation / mirror image conversion processing in this embodiment.

When performing the rotation / mirror image conversion processing, image data with an address is written from the image memory 2 to the memory cell 11 in units of 32 × 32 bits, for example, and when the processing is completed, the image memory 2 is processed from the memory cell 11. Read the data.

Here, from the image memory 2 to the memory cell 11
When the image data is written for each word, the mode register 3 is set (step 1).
If D2 is 1, the up / down inverting unit 12 inverts the bit of the address (step 3), thereby converting the storage location in the memory cell 11, thereby performing up / down inversion of the image data. When D1 of the mode register 3 is 1, the MSB and LSB of each word are exchanged by the left / right inverting unit 13 (step 5), and the image data is stored in the memory cell 11.
(Step 6), the image data is horizontally inverted. When the vertical and horizontal inversions are completed, the memory cell 11 stores the image data in block units.

If D0 in the mode register is 1, the XY inverting section 14 performs inversion processing (step 8).
By the combination of these three inversion processes, rotation by 90 degrees and respective mirror image conversions are performed, and finally image data is returned from the memory cell 11 to the image memory 2 (step 9).

[0021]

As described above, according to the image forming apparatus of the present invention, the upside down reversing means for reversing the image data up and down, and the right and left reversing means for reversing the image data around the center in the Y-axis direction as the center axis. , And X of the image data
XY inversion means for inverting by exchanging the coordinates and the Y coordinate,
By performing rotation and mirror image processing of image data using a combination of upside down reversing means, left and right reversing means, and XY reversing means, it is possible to simplify a circuit for performing rotation by 90 degrees and each mirror image conversion processing. Since the configuration is made up of hardware, processing by software can be reduced, and the image forming apparatus can cope with high-speed rotation and mirror image conversion processing.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the inside of an image forming apparatus according to the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a diagram showing a state in which image data is inverted by means of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing a state in which image data is inverted by means of the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a table showing rotation / mirror image patterns that can be realized by the present invention.

FIG. 5 is a diagram showing the pattern of FIG. 4;

FIG. 6 is a flowchart illustrating an operation of the image forming apparatus of the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

 1: Image rotation / mirror image converter 2: Image memory 3: Mode register 11: Memory cell 12: Vertical inverting unit 13: Left / right inverting unit 14: XY inverting unit

Claims (1)

[Claims] An image forming apparatus for performing rotation and mirror image processing of image data when storing input image data in an image memory and / or reading image data from the image memory. Vertical inverting means for inverting up and down, left and right inverting means for inverting the image data in the center of the Y-axis direction as a center axis, and XY inverting means for inverting the X and Y coordinates of the image data are provided, An image forming apparatus, wherein the image data is rotated / mirror-processed by a combination of the vertical inverting unit, the horizontal inverting unit, and the XY inverting unit.